Chapter 26
That night, Audra dreamed of a demonic temple carved directly from the obsidian in the deepest depths of the earth.
Its halls were black as midnight and shone, glimmering with as many stars as sparkled in the expansive night sky, the columns on either side of the room in which she found herself reaching up to impossible heights for the temple to have been honed from the rock beneath the ground.
Audra’s footsteps faltered. Fear permeated this space as though it were a living thing, writhing around her, within her, as each step of her boots echoed through the chamber, mixing with the whispers in her ears like music.
The torches on either side of her flamed blue in their sconces, the fire unnatural.
She tried to run from the center of the chamber to find an exit, but her dream body was not hers to control, and despite her mind screaming screaming screaming in fear, she could not stray from the path.
She walked ever forward, her movements jerky and wrong, as though she were a puppet being controlled, a plaything of an evil god.
She walked for minutes, hours, days, passing black column after column, the only color the blue flames on either side of her.
Finally, the never-ending room changed, and she saw that at the end of the chamber sat two thrones constructed from bones, lined with sightless skulls.
One throne was empty, and Audra knew somehow that it was meant for her.
The other throne … Something sat in it, a specter filling up the space.
But no matter how much she tried to parse out who—or what—it was that sat on the throne, the cloaked form was only shifting shadows of blackest night, as though made from the same obsidian as the temple.
The closer she got to the twin thrones, the more she knew, in the same way she knew the throne was meant for her, that life could not exist here.
With every step, she grew weaker, more frail.
She knew in her suddenly brittle and aching bones that if she reached the throne, if she sat upon the one meant for her, it would mean her undoing.
She tried to open her jaws to scream, to force her legs from taking these incessant steps, but she was being controlled by a power so much larger than her; she could not fight the god that led her to her death.
The whispering of ghosts urged her forward on a tide of exalted, fervent cries; the closer she came, the louder and more chaotic the cries became until they were a deafening roar.
The shadowed specter raised one cloaked arm, a single skeletal hand extended toward her, one boned finger kinked, the knucklebones curving three times, beckoning her forward, to close the last of the space and take her spot upon the Death Throne.
She paused before the throne of bones and turned, her labored breaths achingly slow, wheezing, rattling gasps.
Her body slowed; terror enveloped her like nothing she’d ever known before as her gaze cast around.
The obsidian temple was suddenly filled with glowing ghosts, animated skeletons with sightless eyes and rotting slivers of flesh and tendon, and awful, clawed, hungry demons all bowing to her.
Her life force nearly drained, she attempted to call for help, to beg these specters to save her.
Her limbs grew limp, her heartbeat—a slow, sluggish flutter—weakened still, her life sputtering out like a fire in the rain; a puppet, her body lowered lowered lowered toward the throne, as the crowd began to cheer.
She knew the moment she made contact with the bones, the last of her life force would be forfeit, and her soul would be trapped in this temple of death for eternity.
She closed her eyes, not wanting to see the glee for her death, as she inhaled the last breath she would ever take.
Audra woke screaming.